Category: BOP
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No Surprise: Case Managers Are Creating Confusion The technical and legal fact is that yes, undocumented inmates should receive benefits from the First Step Act and Second Chance Act, and can be placed in community confinement like a Halfway House. Assuming, of course, that the undocumented inmate’s offense allows qualification. However, case managers in the…
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What’s A Normal Monthly Spend Look Like? Under normal circumstances, without facing any kind of restrictions, an inmate is allowed to spend up to $360 per month within the BOP. However, many federal prisons are experiencing limits right now where inmates can only spend up to $25 per month on hygiene products. During an inmate’s…
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924(c)s And FSA: What About Revocation Of Supervised Release? If you’re a regular consumer of Federal Prison Tips content, you probably already know the answer: Nope. If you’re on a violation or revocation of supervised release and the original charge was a 924(c), you cannot get First Step Act credit. The BOP is not to…
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Do Incident Reports Or “Shots” Affect Me During My Sentence? The question really is – how could they not? It’s incredible how many inmates don’t think an incident report, also known as a “shot,” is serious business when it comes to their time. A shot in federal prison can affect your custody classification (sending you…
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Leaving In Style Normally, when you’re released from federal prison, you get on the bus in a gray sweatsuit and a mesh bag hanging over your shoulder. We recently had someone ask – can you send your loved one some different clothes to wear when they’re released? The answer is yes! But, you can’t just…
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If Your Loved One’s Case Manager Isn’t Doing Their Job, Should You Call? Calling your loved one’s case manager in federal prison is a horrible idea. We understand that when you have a loved one in federal prison, you want to advocate for them. Most men in federal prison go to their loved ones on…
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Conditions Are Terrible Everywhere – It’s A Problem Whether your loved one is at McKean, Florence, FPC Montgomery, Pensacola, Thompson, Beaumont, or Morgantown, whichever federal prison it is, we know is the absolute worst. As a company staffed by those who have been justice impacted, none of us discount for a second that your loved…
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Prison Yard Politics Are No Joke Our receptionists get calls from loved ones all the time who worry about what their loved one needs to do once they hit a federal prison yard. Who should they run with? Where should they spend their time? Where should they eat? What are the do’s and don’ts in…
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How Does The Second Chance Act Work? Let’s take a 360 month sentence, for example. Let’s also say this person does not qualify for benefits via the First Step Act (FSA). In most cases, you will still qualify for benefits from the SCA, even if you don’t qualify for the FSA. The SCA was passed…
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Clearing Up The Confusion Just how many clemencies and pardons will President Donald Trump’s pardon office grant? There seems to be some confusion about this, even though there was a big story about it a few weeks ago. Joe Biden granted 6,600 clemencies before he left office on January 20, 2025. President Trump vowed to…
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What Happened With The Sentencing Commission Amendment Regarding Methampetamines? Circulating rumors concerning a change in how pure vs. mixed methamphetamine, or “ice” is charged are unfortunately untrue, but this wasn’t exactly fake news, either. There was a proposed amendment to the United States Sentencing Guidelines earlier this year. The proposed amendment called for eliminating the…
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When It Comes To Court, Nothing Is Certain Whether you’re in prison or facing federal prison, there’s a number of reasons why anyone who does legal work can’t provide any kind of guarantee. Oftentimes people forget, especially inmates or defendants, that judges are just people, too. If something bad happens that day, if they wake…
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Is It The Case Managers’ Fault? Or, The Halfway House? We all know now about the recent guidance issued by Director Billy Marshall, who plainly stated that FSA and SCA benefits are meant to be stacked when calculating an inmate’s release date to halfway house or home confinement. Case managers are being reported from all…
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Why Is Their Conviction Rate So High? Are the feds really that good? How do they have a 96% conviction rate? Does the FBI, DEA, Homeland Security, and all other federal agencies really have the best investigators in the world? Is that why they have a 96% conviction rate and why there are 155,000 inmates…
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Former CO Blows The Whistle & Gets Punished Apparently Ms. Smith, the unit manager at Yazoo Federal Prison Low in Yazoo, Mississippi, isn’t the only corrupt staff member at the complex. Former correctional officer Fred Chambliss from Yazoo, Mississippi, has gone to the FBI to report the Federal Bureau of Prisons and the Department of…
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The Short Answer, Yes If you’re waiting to self report to federal prison and expect to owe restitution, this is important. Yes, the BOP can take money from your trust fund account, also known as your commissary account, for restitution and court costs, even if you’re not working a job in federal prison. In fact,…
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Cash App Payments, Legality, & If We Accept Them You’ve probably heard from other TikTok creators in the prison space that you can go to prison for sending or receiving cash app payments from somebody in prison, whether it’s state or federal prison. The truth is, there’s no actual law on the books in regards…
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One Singular Line Item For The BOP As you’ve probably heard by now, the Big Beautiful Bill was passed this week in Congress and now will be enacted into law. It has a lot of tax provisions and political consequences we won’t get into. The one thing it gives the federal prison system is $5,000,000,000.…
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Mass Emailing Gets Mass Deleted By The BOP It’s a bad day to be a newsletter distributor like Lisa Legal or Jeremy Gordon, who rely on TRULINCS and CORRLINKS to send their post-conviction law updates in newsletters to inmates in federal prison. About six months ago, the BOP limited the number of messages you could…
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Two Winners Will Get $360 On Their Books July is Freedom Month here at Federal Prison Tips, and we’re giving two winners $360 of free commissary money – that’s enough to max out your spend for an entire month. All you have to do is like, share, and subscribe to Federal Prison Tips on Tiktok…